We had another fabulous birthday party this year, and I have to say I think this one has been my favorite so far! Before the party I made a promise that I wouldn't be stuck behind the camera for the whole thing, and instead I'd be out enjoying the party. Well, because of that I'm very disappointed in the pictures that I did get, but I hope you enjoy this post any way.
About four months before the big day I started planning the party, and had the kids really decide what their theme would be. The kids decided to have a Mario and Princess Peach party, and I'm so glad because it was so much fun to plan and do!
One of the biggest parts for me is the invitations. To me, the invitations set the mood for the party. The better the invitations, the more the kids will be excited for the party. In the past I've made the invitations by hand, but I couldn't find any Mario scrapbook paper and I knew they would take forever to make if I had to create it all myself. So I started searching the internet. There were some cute invitations out there, but nothing really stood out to me. Until I came across
Oh Da Cute! and saw their adorable Mario and Princess Peach invitations. They were perfect! I also knew we were going to have a bounce house, so when I read the invitation that said, "Let's Jump and Bounce..." I couldn't resist, I emailed Judy that day! She was so amazing to work with. She customized my invitations and they were perfect! I had some parents comment that their kids "wanted to frame the invitation," "how did the kids turn into Mario and Princess Peach," and "those are the cutest invitations!" I still have our invitation on the fridge, it's that cute!
I found the costumes for my kids to wear in the invitations at Amazon. Bonus: the kids will be wearing these as their Halloween costumes!
*Judy has generously offered to give any Fabulous Family Finds reader a discount on their next
Oh Da Cute! invitations purchase!*
After I found the invitations I set out on the party hats. I wanted to let every boy have a Mario or Luigi hat and every girl have a Princess Peach crown. I found a few red and green hats at Dollar Tree. I had about everyone I know looking for them at the Dollar Tree stores near them. I called every Dollar Tree store within driving range from me, and even had an amazing friend looking for them as far away as Washington! When it looked like we had bought all we would be able to from Dollar Tree, I had to grab a few more from Walmart, but even those were only $2.50 each. Then I just grabbed some fabric glue and red, green and white felt from Michaels. I also found the crowns for about a dollar a piece at Michaels. The jewels were probably the hardest part of this project. I couldn't find them for a reasonable price any where! I finally did find a pack of 9 at JoAnn's for about $2.50 so I went with that. They were so easy to put on, but I was really surprised that the little girls were asking if they could have a Mario or Luigi hat instead!
I didn't get a great picture of the bounce castle, but it was perfect for the party. The kids had so much fun with it that they didn't even play half of the games I had planned. All they wanted to do was bounce! I will definitely be getting a bounce house for another party, it made my job so easy! I rented the bounce castle from
Sumo Party Planners on a deal similar to the one they have today at Davis County's
Go Deal Go, and it made it really affordable. Vic from
Sumo Party Planners was really easy to work with and flexible with my crazy schedule.
What would a Mario Party be without Mario's Powers? So I got some cute little candy jars and made powers signs for them. I filled the Ice Power with round gumballs, the Fly Power with Air Heads and the Star Power with square gum. The kids thought it was so fun!
Any summer time party needs to have lots of drinks available, especially an active party like ours was. So I set up big jugs of Luigi Lemonade, Wario Water and Koopa Kool-Aid.
And as a refreshing snack, Princess Peach Popsicles!
When the guests arrived at the party they were greeted by the big Happy Birthday sign! These signs can be so expensive to buy, so I decided to make my own with some help from my Mom and sister-in-law. I'm happy I did because it turned out exactly how I wanted it, and more important, how the kids wanted it.
After the kids had chosen a hat and had some time to bounce in the castle, we started the games!
Before the party I made name tags and separated the kids into different colored groups by their age group. With 36 kids at this party, I knew I needed to divide into groups to keep it under control.
I wanted the games to all have a Mario twist to them, so to start off we played "Musical Pipes," just like musical chairs, only there were water-filled "pipes" instead of chairs. I found these green tubs at Dollar Tree and they worked great!
Then the kids played "Don't Drop the Bob-omb
The younger kids also played a twist on "Duck, Duck, Goose" where instead of the traditional game, the kids would say, "Mario, Mario, Bowser."
My little boy wanted to have a tug-of-war, so they did that to see which Mario team was the strongest.
Then we had a blast with a water fight! I filled two big tubs with water and had lots of "power" sponges. The kids would throw the sponges at the other team, not being able to cross the middle line. They had to keep refueling their powers. Next to the bounce castle, I think this game was the biggest hit.
After the games it was time for cake and ice cream. I had so much fun making these "Toad" cupcakes, and they were so easy! I used lots of colorful frosting and then topped them with circle cut out fondant. Then I used edible markers to make the little eyes. It was fun to let the kids choose their favorite color of cupcake. I bought the little individual cup ice creams from Walmart, so much easier than scooping out ice cream for the almost sixty people who were there!
Every Mario needs a mustache so I made chocolate mustache suckers for each kid with a mold I found on Amazon.
When the party was coming to an end, I had the kids each find a hidden "Yoshi Egg" filled with Mario fruit snacks. I knew I wanted to do something like this so I saved my Easter Eggs from Easter. I didn't know I'd only be able to use the large eggs, so I was glad I had a friend who had some saved that she let me have. It's not easy to find Easter Eggs in the summer! Then I just used my Cricut and vinyl to make different sized ovals to turn the plain eggs into Yoshi Eggs.
When the kids showed me that they had found their Yoshi Egg I gave them each a big lollipop that I bought from
Oriental Trading and then I just made these little "Game Over, Thanks for Playing" tags to put on them.
Each kid also got a chocolate Wii remote (I found these molds on Amazon, also) with a little tag I made saying, "Wii Thank You for coming to our party." It was the perfect way to end our party.
We had so much fun and are already looking forward to next year's party!
for about $23, more depending on size.
for about $19.
from about $23.
from about $20. These run a little small, so I would recommend buying it a little bigger than you usually do. I think it's so smart to buy these now before the rush for Halloween comes and prices sky rocket! I did see these costumes at Wal Mart last year for about $19 in their costumes if you'd rather wait, but not every store carried them.
